This invention is in the field of coin counters and in the general field of coin wrapping such as is done at businesses and banks for the storage of coins of known quantity in wrappers.
In past years there have been many proposals for the using of a hollow tube for receiving coins, such tubes having indicia on the side to indicate the number of coins in a tube. A funnel at the top of such a tube has been proposed.
However, to our knowledge there has never been a counting tube with a funnel at its top end and with an easily and quickly removable plug at the bottom end. We propose such a plug so that the bottom end of the tube can be inserted into the open top of a cylindrical coin wrapper for emptying into the wrapper an exact number of counted coins. We consider that it is important that the plug seal off the interior of the hollow shank at a precise position for upholding the lowermost coin in a stack so that upper coins register with the indicia on the shank.
We are aware of a U.S. Pat. No. 1,110,174 issued to E. Zander, titled: "COIN TUBE" issued Sept. 8, 1914. This patent has a cap at the bottom, but is without any teaching concerning its removability. We presume it was permanently attached to stay in place.
We are aware of a U.S. Pat. No. 2,150,473, issued to A. N. Wagner, Mar. 14, 1939, titled, DEVICE FOR FILLING COIN WRAPPERS WITH COINS. It does have a plug, but not in the bottom of a coin counting tube, but instead at the bottom of a coin folder.
Also we propose that the weak and wobbly wrapper not be a structural member of the counter, but instead to be stretched from its flat nature to its cylindrical nature by a tapered lower end of the counting shank, whereby the folder need not hold a cylindrical shape until such time as the coins themselves fill it and give it shape-holding capacity.
We are also aware of many other patents, all of which have permanent bottom wall means, fixed to the tubular shank.
To our knowledge, no earlier patents on coin counters propose that coins be emptied from the lower end of a hollow shank into a coin wrapper.
Because it is desirable to make the shank out of plastic materials which have a substantial thickness in order to be strong, it is one of the concepts of our invention to provide for an inward tapering of the lower end of the hollow shank for easier reception in the upper end of a coin wrapper tube.
We conceive that the various coin counters of progressively smaller size coins could be stored with the smaller hollow shanks nested in progressively larger hollow shanks of counters for the larger coins.